On the Road Again

With apologies to WN, we're On The Road Again. I won't say that it's in search of adventure, because that usually finds us whether we want it or not. This time, we're going back to the place of our roots, central New York. We've spent a good part of our lives in Jordan, NY and so we're back here for another dose of the Jordan Fall Festival that's coming up this weekend.
We left Burlington, NC on Friday afternoon later than than I would have chosen. We started later in the week because I had the coach in to Cummins Atlantic for service that ran long (another story) and later in the day because I took too long to get packed. Oh well, we're retired so not to worry.

WE came up rt 49 to 62 into Danville, VA where we picked up 29 and followed that all the way up to 17 in Warrenton, VA and then up to I66 and then to I81. The idea was to travel int the valley all the way up to avoid the big hills on I81. That worked out pretty well but we found ourselves in rush hour Friday afternoon traffic going north out of Charlottesville. That lasted for about 30 miles of stop and go but  we eventually got to our stopping point at the Cracker Barrel in Winchester, VA at exit 313. Dinner and an overnite and then we were on our way up into central PA.
We crossed the I81 bridge over the Susquehanna in Harrisburg and could see that the river was in flood stage. I had chosen to follow 322 north along the river to get to rt 15 further north. We saw signs that 322 had reopened. That was our first hint of what was to come. From the Southern to the Northern border of PA, we saw massive, tragic flooding. We saw house and whole settlements in the water. Not up to the roofs but certainly in the front doors. Many campgrounds exit along the river and the campers had been pulled out and lined up along the sides of the highway. We one settlement isolated in the water with disaster relief supplying it and looking out at an old brick structure that had caught fire and burned with no way to stop it.
We made a couple of shopping stops and keep moving north into Bradford County.
I had spotted a campground listing that looked like a good place to overnite but when we got there, it was covered in piles of stone and silt from the flood a couple of days earlier. I foolishly tried to pull in to what looked like solid ground and turned out to be covered in a foot of silt. I nearly buried the coach up to the axles but kept on churning and made it to solid ground. The owner came out an used his tractor to smooth the rocks enough for me to get back on the road. Talk about dumb!
Well, we kept on keeping on until we got to Canton, PA and I though we might stay the night in a parking lot. So I went into the Subway, the only place open, and asked permission. There wasn't anybody there who could OK it but a gal working there called her father and asked him. He volunteered to have us park in front of his barn, so she led us out into the country to the farm. His driveway had been washed away but he had repaired it well enough for me get in and the place was beautiful.

It turned out to be a poultry farm. Now, I know you're thinking "What about the smell?". Really, it was very mild and virtually non-existent inside the coach. So we slept well and got back on the road about 9:00am on Sunday.
My plan had been to explore the area a little since my ancestors came from there but that plan got washed out by the flood. Virtually every low lying road was closed and even the roads in the hills were heavily eroded. Every little trickle had become a torrent and washed out roads and driveways. I opted to continue north on 14 up to Troy where I picked up US6, thinking it, being the main road in the area, would be our best way out. Well, it was, but not without it's problems as well. It had washed away in several places but had been made passable. We came across one place where there was a sturdy concrete bridge and the water had just bypassed the bridge and lifted the whole roadbed and guardrails and everything and cast them aside.  We finally made it to 220 north and followed that up to NY only to find that I17 eastbound was closed. So we took rt 34 all the way up to Ithaca and stopped at an old hangout, Mano's Diner, for breakfast. Leaving there, we continued on 34 to come up to Jordan.
Along the way, out in the middle of nothing but acres of cornfields, we smelled burned rubber. I got out to check and found that I had blown the inside right dual tire and the sidewall had shredded. And I had been driving on it since Canton!. Talk about dumb and lucky at the same time. Well, I decided to chance keeping going since we had come this far and we made all the way to our stop. Now I'm shopping for tires. Since I stressed the outside tire so heavily, I'll need to replace it as well. I really think I'll replace all four across the back since the mismatch would be so great.
So that's our adventure so far. I can do with some calm for a few days. Stay tuned. I've got to limber up the camera and get some pictures in here. The ones I took are in my iPad and I don't know how to get them out yet.